Video communications often include a communication of both video data and audio data that is exchanged between communication partners. Video communication typically requires a use of a relatively large amount of bandwidth, which is often a limited resource in networks and communication systems. The large amounts of bandwidth needed for such communications often increases costs associated with such communications and may result in reduced quality of the communications during high traffic times where there is a limited amount of available bandwidth in a particular network or communication system.
During video calls, a communication may include a switch or bandwidth resource manager reserving a large amount of bandwidth for a particular communication that may at least initially include video and audio. Large reservations may reduce the amount of bandwidth available to other users even if that full amount of bandwidth is not needed throughout an entire communication. Further, video may be transmitted during such a communication even when a user is not providing a recorded video that is needed or wanted by other communication partners. For instance, a user may move out of a camera range for a portion of a communication and video may still be transmitted that merely illustrates an empty room or empty chair.
A new apparatus is needed by which communications that utilize video can require a reduced amount of bandwidth. Such a new apparatus is preferably configured to help reduce the bandwidth required for an ongoing communication session and also permits a bandwidth reservation made for such a communication to be reduced in real-time, or substantially real-time.